and georgetown law school she worked on presidential campaigns for john kerry in 2004 and president obama in 2008. in 2010, kuster ran for office herself. >> a very good time to get involved in the political process myself. so i ran in 2010 and only lost by 3,000 votes in a big republican wave. it made all the sense in the world to run again. >> kuster is a part of the new hampshire matriarchy. she represents her state along with another congresswoman, two female senators and governor f maggie hassan. >> we have a long tradition of women working in new hampshire. i also think that the electorate has a great deal of respect for women. we were very fortunate with senator jean shaheen, who was our first woman governor, and the only woman in the country to serve as both governor and in the united states senate. i think the voters have tremendous respect for the performance of women in politics. we maybe tend to be a little bit less contentious, a little bit more conciliatory in terms of bringing people together, looking for compromise, looking for ways to work together, and that's what the vo